I'm looking to get into shooting some birds with a camera in the off season. I think my budget is going to be someplace around $400, but maybe $600 if I can swing it. I'm looking for any advice on a good starting point for a camera and anything else I might need to take quality action shots? Thanks

I think you should start off with any of the super compacts like the sony, canon nikon or panasonic with at least 15x (20x optical zoom would be better) and learn how to understand a camera works and to use the settings on these cameras. Then you could branch out and sell the camera for half price and then jump into th DSLR knowing what is required